SEO is Dying - Death of the Small SEO/SEM Firm

[Nick W]

http://www.searchenginejournal.com/index.php?p=978

Personally it just confirms the obvious. I think we will begin to see the small SEO/SEM companies having to rapidly switch tack or die within the next couple of years.

To hell with the ethics debate and guidelines and codes of conduct, this is business! :eek: and it's high time that the SEO/SEM community realized it.

Nick

[littleman]

2004 is better than 2002 in my opinion. We have two major players with real spidering engines and another one on the way if MS could get its act together.

But SEM has really done a number on the landscape. It's simplicity and easy quantifiability has pulled in a lot of slick sales guys.

[rcjordan]

No doubt about it, there's blood in the water.

http://www.mediapost.com/dtls_dsp_SearchInsider.cfm?fnl=041021
http://www.kelseygroup.com/ilm2004/ilm2004_day1.htm

>2004

Yes, it's been a very good (and incredibly easy) year --perhaps even the zenith of the Golden Age of Independent SEO. But Debbie has been fretting over the implications of search advertising overtaking/supplanting/becoming big media advertising. Dancing with elephants requires either great bulk or great agility.

[seobook]

there is still tons of low cost opportunity out there. newspapers selling high PR low traffic page banners on a cheap cpm basis. lots of blogs are still easily commentable. more and more directories are springing up. Yahoo is absurdely easy to rank in.

opportunity for small guys like me is still there in a big way IMHO.

[Nick W]

I can see independent affiliates doing well in a market where the seo 'firms' are struggling...

Kiss your 'code of conduct' goodbye boys, G and Y! just declared war...

Nick

[rcjordan]

You're making the assumption that the serps will remain much as-is. Consider the possiblity of a vastly altered landscape where free/natural slots are displaced in the money categories.

[Nick W]

I must admit RC i find that hard to envision, not impossible, but hard.

Searchers/users do want information. Informational resources are generally free(ish) - though i can certainly see a huge push on things along the lines of froogle and y! shopping etc making it harder to get traffic for for 'buying phrases'...

Nick

[rcjordan]

>hard to envision

Déjà vu helps, Nick. (Caution to new readers, the following link causes a rift in the Space-Time Continuum.)

http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum20/15.htm

[Nick W]

Im not sure why I would have done, as it was 2yrs b4 my time at wmw and a year b4 i actually owned a PC but i've read that thread..

de ja vu on your de ja vu hehe....

Well, i will bow to your greater wisdom on this, I cant say that it fills me with dread though, there is always a way for a stainless steel rat to make good in any environment..

Interesting to see a thread from back when AV was considered important (for a relative youngster like me..)

Good link!

Nick

[rcjordan]

>your greater wisdom on this

Not much wisdom involved, nor reading tea leaves for that matter. You've said it already in the first post ...this is just business (BIG business) between the SEs and media buyers and I think a natural outcome of that will be the retooling of the serps to maximize revenues.

>dread

I do not think small SEOrs will become extinct, but neither do I think they will remain the dominant species.

[Mikkel deMib Svendsen]

Interesting to see a thread from back when AV was considered important

You make me feel so old ... I remember when AV was about to get big :eek:

[rcjordan]

No getting off that easily, Mikkel. What say ye re the fate of the small SEO?

[Nick W]

Nah..

I just came to it late, im 33 and didnt have my own PC till we moved to denmark and i had nothing better to do with my time..

that was 2000/2001 i think.. :)

Nick

[Mikkel deMib Svendsen]

Well, I am a small SEO and I am certainly not dying - not even close. And you know what, I adapt to anything - bring it on, I am ready :)

[randfish]

It would seem more likely to me that SEO will continue to flourish until the time when large corporations see fit to use their time and resources to try and dominate the SERPs. Amazon certainly hasn't tried.. Walmart isn't trying... Best Buy, Sears...

I would guess we are in a golden age that will get more golden as more small and mid-sized companies continue to throw money at Internet Marketing. The bad times are ahead, but they are at least 3-5 years away.

Being prepared can't hurt - though. I'm gonna diversify as fast as possible and make sure that no single industry trend or change can wipe out my business. I suggest we all do the same.

[Nacho]

Interesting thread topic.

Personally it just confirms the obvious. I think we will begin to see the small SEO/SEM companies having to rapidly switch tack or die within the next couple of years.
In my experience, finding the right niche where you are the best in the industry is working very well for me. My clients include some of the largest SEM firms out there which can not provide my services today, so it's in their best interests and their clients to outsource to specialists. It gives me a shot at working with Fortune 500s and increase my firm's reputation faster.

Its kinda like being the right pupil eye surgeon. You have to know eye surgery to the highest levels, but no one does that one pupil better than you. So when clients want the best . . . the best can be you.

Mis 2 centavitos ;)

[I, Brian]

SEO is dying??

You mean people are not complaining of a poorer return of investment from PPC compared to good organic listings?

You mean major advertising companies can offer competitive salaries to any of the experienced commercial SEO's on this forum?

I strike no to both. Small business SEO lives well and prospers. :)

[Jeremy_Goodrich]

>>experienced commercial SEO's on this forum?

Imho, you swap one headache for another - it just depends on which one you want, having your own business on the one hand, or the mythical 'steady paycheck' on the other. You might be surprised at what an experienced SEO is worth now, as companies are starting to understand the value.

Though for "small firms" from what I've seen with friends businesses, there are no problems, only growth - and that, in it's own special way, can be a type of 'problem' or perhaps better stated - interesting challenge.